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English Questions For IBPS RRB PO and Clerk Exam 2017

English Section is a topic that is feared by most of the candidates appearing in the IBPS PO Exam. Though the sheer number of concepts and rules may seem intimidating at first, with discipline and the right approach, it is not difficult to master these concepts and their application to questions. Through suchEnglish Quizzes, we will provide you all types of high-level questions to ace the Cloze Test questions based on new pattern English section of banking exams.

Directions (1-15): In the following passage there are blanks, each of which has been numbered. These numbers are printed in the passage and against each, five words are suggested, one of which fits the blanks appropriately. Find out the appropriate word in each case.

Global commodities have witnessed a bull run over the last 12 months, reviving hopes of the beginning of the next supercycle in commodity prices. It is too ___(1)___ to predict massive price

inflation, reminiscent of the commodities boom of the 2000s. But the present rally __(2)____ driven more by easy money than anything else. The current price __(3)___ began with the election of Donald Trump as U.S. President, which led to hopes of ___(4)___ public investment in infrastructure projects. Signs of a revival of the global economy and __(5)___ on production imposed by the Chinese government to tackle pollution also led speculators to bid up commodities in anticipation of inadequate supply. Aluminum prices hit a record six-year high last month, while commodities such as copper, zinc and nickel recorded multi-year highs recently. Many of these __(6)____ have risen in the range of 30% to 40% over the last year. It is notable that the end of the previous commodities super cycle in 2014, followed by a steep __(7)___ in prices in the next two years, coincided with the slowdown in the Chinese economy. Signs of economic recovery, driven __(8)___ by stimulus investment in Chinese infrastructure, have thus had a significantly favorable impact on commodity prices for now. Oil alone has been an outlier to the recent trend, with the U.S. shale industry having destroyed OPEC’s strong control over supply. The recent run-up in commodity __(9)____ , however, can only be partially explained by structural changes in demand and supply.

A vital clue to the rest of the story lies in how commodity prices have performed vis-a-vis the U.S. dollar. The dollar ___(10)___ in the last quarter of 2016 even as commodity prices shot up due to market euphoria after the election of Mr. Trump. This was in direct contrast to the historical relationship between the dollar and commodity prices, which saw a stronger dollar associated with weaker commodity prices. The new relationship ____(11)__ the dollar and commodities continued into the first half of 2017; this time around, however, the dollar weakened by as much as 5% while commodity prices dropped in tandem. The earlier market euphoria around a recovery in commodities demand backed by a stronger economy had died out pretty fast. In fact, the first half of 2017 ___(12)___ out to be a particularly ugly one for commodities with a sharp drop in prices. Consequently, even after the recent boost in prices, the Bloomberg Commodity Index currently continues to trade lower year-to-date. The last few months, however, have ___(13)___ a recovery in the commodity index, along with the historic relationship between the dollar and commodities being restored. In fact, the U.S. dollar index has now dropped by almost 10% since the ___(14)___ of the year. This might suggest that the current rally in commodities may be largely __(15)___ by a weakening dollar rather than any substantial change in global economic outlook.